William Wallace Casper Mormon Batallion Company A

With special permission from the first Presidency of the Church, on February 18, 1848, William Wallace Casper, a former member of the Mormon Battalion, left the “Old Fort” (located on the site of what is now Pioneer Park) in Salt Lake City and came southeast to settle on a choice and fertile piece of ground. He homesteaded on 119 acres of ground (east and west of the “Upper County Road”, now known as Highland Drive, and north and south of 4100 South). After he and his brother-in-law got the crops planted, his wife Sarah Ann Bean Casper and daughter Sarah Jane, joined him.